The Dikikka Child and Homo Floresiensis – Assignment Example

The paper "The Dikikka Child and Homo Floresiensis" is an excellent example of an anthropology assignment.
The Dikikka Child, or Lucy’s baby, is the given to a 3.3 million-year-old baby fossil of the Australopithecus afarensis family. The fossil caused a rethinking of human evolution due to several of its features. Its brain was smaller than a chimpanzee. This suggests that early hominids did not have large brains. The fossil also indicates that though the species was bipedal, their upper bodies displayed an inclination to an arboreal lifestyle.
The A. afarensis find echoes that of A. sediba in several ways. The A. sediba fossils also display a smaller brain, large pelvis, and arboreal tendencies. In addition, both finds contain juveniles of their respective species. This has led to controversy over whether juveniles are accurate representations of their species. The debate over accuracy is attributable to how they have reshaped theories on human evolution. These discoveries hint at a non-linear evolution of the genus Homo. They suggest that there may have been several different Australopithecines, one of which was the predecessor of the genus Homo.
Alien from Earth
Homo Floresiensis is a unique species discovered in Flores, Indonesia. The find of this species was revolutionary due to its completely unusual nature: the adults of the species were one third the size of modern humans. The species had brains smaller than a chimpanzee’s, yet evidence indicated that they made tools, hunted and used fire. The species has been nicknamed “the Hobbit”. In the documentary, Chris Stringer discusses how the find has revolutionized what people think of as “human”. Humans are bipedal, tool-using and large-brained. Tool-making was attributed to increased cranial capacity that made it possible to conduct the complex maneuvers required.
Discoveries such as Floresiensis, Lucy’s baby and A. sediba challenge the conventional notions of human evolution. They force us to reconsider the fundamentals of what makes us human and sets us apart from other species. Though these discoveries may challenge human notions of superiority and “specialness”, the fact still remains that humans have persevered and weathered many storms to emerge victoriously. This aspect is what makes humans, human.